Throughout the history, different types of businesses have reflected the zeitgeist of the specific era. Today, the globalization has led to the rise of the third wave of internationalization, which has increased the importance of emerging markets in the global business environment. An additional global trend that reflects today’s businesses is to fulfill social purposes along with making profit. The latter global trend entails the rise of the social sector in industrialized countries, including social enterprises. There is currently no universal definition of social enterprises as well as a lack of theoretical contribution on those; however, there is a lot of passion for the topic. In Sweden, social enterprises are associated with work integration social enterprises (WISEs), although other types of social enterprises exist, for example those finding opportunities in social issues in emerging markets. The purpose of this thesis is therefore to increase the holistic awareness for a wider concept of social enterprises in Sweden. To be able to increase this awareness, the aim is to examine how Swedish social enterprises turn social issues in emerging markets into business opportunities. It is further interesting to emphasize the challenges social enterprises are facing, as well as how they use their business models and strategies inorder to cope with the challenges. This study is carried out through a qualitative case-study of three Swedish social enterprises that are or were operating in emerging markets to some extent. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with one representative from each enterprise. The findings show that social enterprises have the ability to turn social issues into business opportunities. In addition, being able to balance making social impact with profit-making is one main challenge for Swedish social enterprises, especially in emerging markets as the enterprises’ core mission might be questioned regarding who their operations will benefit. The findings of this thesis have also shown that social enterprises commonly are taking the whole value-chain into account. Furthermore, as emerging markets are fast-changing and uncertain, it is difficult to plan ahead for what to come. Finally, as this thesis’ purpose states, it is thus crucial to increase the awareness and knowledge of these kinds of social enterprises since this will help them improving and increase their social impact.

This research presents the results of a qualitative and quantitative investigation into what factors are present at time zero that increase the probability that a startup will achieve long term sustainability. Survival rates for startups in the United States (U.S.) are disappointingly low and economically inefficient. The data shows that the U.S. clearly lags its peer countries in the survival rates of startups. The U.S ranked an unacceptable 11th of 14 among its peer countries in first-year survival rates in recent years. Startup failure does not only impact the entrepreneur; it also impacts creditors, vendors, community stakeholders, and employees. While it is commonly acknowledged that entrepreneurial businesses contribute to economic growth, the influential impact survival can have on economic growth within the community is often understated. The economic impact of startups on the community makes this area of research even more vital. To avoid failure and improve the sustainability of startups requires an in-depth understanding of the factors that are causal and non-causal to sustainability. While there has been significant investment and support by communities, government, and private foundations, startup failure rates remain virtually unchanged in the last two decades. Despite the many years of research in the field of entrepreneurship, U.S. failure rates within the first five years’ average 53%, regardless of the industry membership or economic cycles. Identifying factors that are causal and non-causal to the sustainability of emerging businesses is crucial to the founders and stakeholders. Within this study, both internal and external factors that may be causal to the macro survival rate of U.S. startups were studied. The external factors were studied quantitatively, using data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) and the Brookings Institute. A protocol of regression analysis and visual analytics were applied to evaluate the quantitative data. It demonstrated that external factors such as the change in real gross domestic product (RGDP), interest rates, and expansion of accelerators have had no significant effect on U.S. macro startup survival rates. Further, the findings confirm that neither geographic location nor industry membership impacted U.S. macro startup survival rates. Internal factors were studied qualitatively, using a grounded theory protocol. The qualitative research did uncover three internal factors that were causal to survival of the startups studied. Those internal factors were:  Career Autonomy – The entrepreneurs motivated by career autonomy were significantly more likely to achieve long-term sustainability.  Allies – The entrepreneurs who identify and utilized allies were more likely to survive.  Purposeful Margin of Safety model – Startups whose founders had a rigorous understanding of the margin of safety (MOS) and its underlying elements of pricing and break-even analysis were more likely to survive. This qualitative study provides significant evidence that, when these three causal factors are present, the likelihood of sustainability is high. These findings extend our knowledge on how to improve the probability of sustainability for the firms. This study demonstrates that the U.S. can and should improve its startup survival rates by focusing on the internal factors that are necessary at time zero to ensure sustainability and survival.

Lean strategy deployment (LSD) provides a means to create lasting value at reduced cost; yet most LSD efforts fail to attain sustainable improvements. The current study sought to gain an understanding of how leaders in oral healthcare manufacturing setting in the northeastern region of the United States can apply self-efficacy and leadership commitment during an LSD. Using Bandura’s theory of self-efficacy this qualitative phenomenological study examined the lived experiences and perceptions of 15 mid-to-senior level managers, concerning the use of self-efficacy and leadership commitment during a lean strategy deployment (LSD). The key findings resulted in 10 emergent themes. The top 3 highly regarded themes that emerged from this study were: (1) committing to a lean strategy deployment, (2) communicating lessons learned/changes, and (3) bringing the best out of employees. LSDs are not easy to implement. Many companies attempt to carry out lean activities and many of these same companies fail to have successful results. To be effective, leaders should focus on creating sound practices and give more attention to the human behaviors and leadership characteristics needed to support eliminating barriers and creating a lean culture.